OpenTaxi Launches The First Ever Universal Taxi App in Competition with Uber

OpenTaxi Technologies, LLC proudly announce the release of their HTML5 taxi hailing app called OpenTaxi. Amr Metwally, CEO and creator of the app explains that the open source application does everything for legitimate taxi that you expect from the major rideshare apps. “We provide all the popular features Uber offers including scheduled rides known as time calls”, says, Amr. Indeed, the only Uber feature lacking is pooled rides which according to many drivers and even passengers on the the popular rideshare forums uberpeople.net won’t be missed.

While some say it is too late to salvage the taxi industry, Amr lamented, “As a software engineer, early 2009, I came up with the idea similar to Uber while moonlighting as a LA Cabbie.” Unfortunately for Amr, stiff taxicab regulations crippled his idea before writing a line of code. Fortunately, in 2014, Eric Spiegelman, a forward thinking entertainment lawyer was appointed president of the Los Angeles Taxicab Commission by city mayor Eric Garcetti for the sole purpose of making taxi more like Uber.

Although OpenTaxi was not the first taxi app to tackle Uber. As Andrey Primushko president of United Taxi put it, “We have two types of apps presented to us. Either by developers who know technology or cab drivers who know the business.” What makes OpenTaxi so unique is that Amr knows both, mobile technology and the taxi business.

Yet, the same question remains posed by pundits, “Why taxis? Uber is cheaper and the service is better.” Arthur, owner and operator of a United Taxi cab responds, “It’s true, in the past, we made mistakes. But now with our livelihoods in peril, we must change.” And change will come. In addition to a smiley or sad faced ratings system, The Plunge is OpenTaxi’s secret weapon.

After a long Halloween weekend, millions of riders around the world have woken up to astronomical Uber bills sometimes exceeding 10 times the normal fare. “The Surge is modern day highway robbery” warns Arthur of United Taxi. “Rules and regulations for taxi were put in place to protect the public from price gouging”. Taxi drivers like Uber drivers are independent contractors. Amr elaborates, “We give them the power to change the meter rate. Never above city rates but as low as half off”.

OpenTaxi is a Los Angeles based complete start-to-end commissioned taxicab app. From booking to tracking, OpenTaxi handles both real-time meter fare and billing. Only city franchised taxi companies can use our service ensuring maximum accountability and responsibility.